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Once on a Time

A. A. Milne


  CHAPTER VIII

  PRINCE UDO SLEEPS BADLY

  Everybody likes to make a good impression on his first visit, butthere were moments just before his arrival in Euralia when Prince Udodoubted whether the affair would go as well as he had hoped. Youshall hear why.

  He had been out hunting with his friend, the young Duke Coronel, andwas returning to the Palace when Hyacinth's messenger met him. Hetook the letter from him, broke the seals, and unrolled it.

  "Wait a moment, Coronel," he said to his friend. "This is going to bean adventure of some sort, and if it's an adventure I shall want youwith me."

  "I'm in no hurry," said Coronel, and he got off his horse and gave itinto the care of an attendant. The road crossed a stream here.Coronel sat up on the little stone bridge and dropped pebbles idlyinto the water.

  The Prince read his letter.

  _Plop . . . Plop . . . Plop . . . Plop . . ._

  The Prince looked up from his letter.

  "How many days' journey is it to Euralia?" he asked Coronel.

  "How long did it take the messenger to come?" answered Coronel,without looking up. (_Plop._)

  "I might have thought of that myself," said Udo, "only this letter hasrather upset me." He turned to the messenger. "How long has it----?"

  "Isn't the letter dated?" said Coronel. (_Plop._)

  Udo paid no attention to this interruption and finished his questionto the messenger.

  "A week, sire."

  "Ride on to the castle and wait for me. I shall have a message foryou."

  "What is it?" said Coronel, when the messenger had gone. "Anadventure?"

  "I think so. I think we may call it that, Coronel."

  "With me in it?"

  "Yes, I think you will be somewhere in it."

  Coronel stopped dropping his pebbles and turned to the Prince.

  "May I hear about it?"

  Udo help out the letter; then feeling that a lady's letter should beprivate, drew it back again. He prided himself always on doing thecorrect thing.

  "It's from Princess Hyacinth of Euralia," he said; "she doesn't saymuch. Her father is away fighting, and she is alone and she is insome trouble or other. It ought to make rather a good adventure."

  Coronel turned away and began to drop his pebbles into the streamagain.

  "Well, I wish you luck," he said. "If it's a dragon, don't forgetthat----"

  "But you're coming, too," said Udo, in dismay. "I must have you withme."

  "Doing what?"

  "What?"

  "Doing what?" said Coronel again.

  "Well," said Prince Udo awkwardly, "er--well, you--well."

  He felt that it was a silly question for Coronel to have asked.Coronel knew perfectly well what he would be doing all the time. InUdo's absence he would be telling Princess Hyacinth stories of hisRoyal Highness's matchless courage and wisdom. An occasionaldiscussion also with the Princess upon the types of masculine beauty,leading up to casual mention of Prince Udo's own appearance, would bequite in order. When Prince Udo was present Coronel would no doubtfind the opportunity of drawing Prince Udo out, an opportunity ofwhich a stranger could not so readily avail himself.

  But of course you couldn't very well tell Coronel that. A man of anytact would have seen it at once.

  "Of course," he said, "don't come if you don't like. But it wouldlook rather funny if I went quite unattended; and--and her RoyalHighness is said to be very beautiful," he added lamely.

  Coronel laughed. There are adventures and adventures; to sit next toa very beautiful Princess and discuss with her the good looks ofanother man was not the sort of adventure that Coronel was lookingfor.

  He tossed the remainder of his pebbles into the stream and stood up.

  "Of course, if your Royal Highness wishes----"

  "Don't be a fool, Coronel," said his Royal Highness, rather snappily.

  "Well, then, I'll come with my good friend Udo if he wants me."

  "I do want you."

  "Very well, that settles it. After all," he added to himself, "theremay be _two_ dragons."

  Two dragons would be one each. But from all accounts there were nottwo Princesses.

  * * * * *

  So three days later the friends set out with good hearts upon theadventure. The messenger had been sent back to announce theirarrival; they gave him three days' start, and hoped to gain two daysupon him. In the simple fashion of those times (so it would seem fromRoger Scurvilegs) they set out with no luggage and no clear idea ofwhere they were going to sleep at night. This, after all, is the bestspirit in which to start a journey. It is the Gladstone bag which haskilled romance.

  They started on a perfect summer day, and they rode past towers andbattlements, and by the side of sparkling streams, and came out intothe sunlight again above sleepy villages, and, as they rode, Coronelsang aloud and Udo tossed his sword into the air and caught it again.As evening fell they came to a woodman's cottage at the foot of a highhill, and there they decided to rest for the night. An old woman cameout to welcome them.

  "Good evening, your Royal Highness," she said.

  _As evening fell they came to a woodman's cottage atthe foot of a high hill_]

  "You know me?" said Udo, more pleased than surprised.

  "I know all who come into my house," said the old woman solemnly, "andall who go away from it."

  This sort of conversation made Coronel feel creepy. There seemed tobe a distinction between the people who came to the house and thepeople who went away from it which he did not like.

  "Can we stay here the night, my good woman?" said Udo.

  "You have hurt your hand," she said, taking no notice of his question.

  "It's nothing," said Udo hastily. On one occasion he had caught hissword by the sharp end by mistake--a foolish thing to have done.

  "Ah, well, since you won't want hands where you're going, it won'tmatter much."

  It was the sort of thing old women said in those days, and Udo did notpay much attention to it.

  "Yes, yes," he said; "but can you give my friend and myself a bed forto-night?"

  "Seeing that you won't be travelling together long, come in andwelcome."

  She opened the door and they followed her in.

  As they crossed the threshold, Udo half turned round and whisperedover his shoulder to Coronel,

  "Probably a fairy. Be kind to her."

  "How can one be kind to one's hostess?" said Coronel. "It's she whohas to be kind to _us_."

  "Well, you know what I mean; don't be rude to her."

  "My dear Udo, this to _me_--the pride of Araby, the favourite courtierof his Majesty, the----"

  "Oh, all right," said Udo.

  "Sit down and rest yourselves," said the old woman. "There'll besomething in the pot for you directly."

  "Good," said Udo. He looked approvingly at the large cauldron hangingover the fire. It was a big fireplace for such a small room. So hethought when he first looked at it, but as he gazed, the room seemedto get bigger and bigger, and the fireplace to get farther and fartheraway, until he felt that he was in a vast cavern cut deep into themountainside. He rubbed his eyes, and there he was in the smallkitchen again and the cauldron was sending out a savoury smell.

  "There'll be something in it for all tastes," went on the old woman,"even for Prince Udo's."

  "I'm not so particular as all that," said Udo mildly. The room hadjust become five hundred yards long again, and he was feeling quiet.

  "Not now, but you will be."

  She filled them a plate each from the pot; and pulling their chairs upto the table, they fell to heartily.

  "This is really excellent," said Udo, as he put down his spoon andrested for a moment.

  "You'd think you'd always like that, wouldn't you?" she said.

  "I always shall be fond of anything so perfectly cooked."

  "Ah," remarked the old woman thoughtfully.

  Udo was beginning to dislike her part
icular style of conversation. Itseemed to carry the merest suggestion of a hint that somethingunpleasant was going to happen to him. Nothing apparently was goingto happen to Coronel. He tried to drag Coronel into the conversationin case the old woman had anything over for him.

  "My friend and I," he said, "hope to be in Euralia the day afterto-morrow."

  "No harm in hoping," was the answer.

  "Dear me, is something going to happen to us on the way?"

  "Depends what you call 'us.'"

  Coronel pushed back his chair and got up.

  "I know what's going to happen to me," he said. "I'm going to sleep."

  "Well," said Udo, getting up too, "we've got a long day before usto-morrow, and apparently we are in for an adventure--er, _we_ are infor an adventure of some sort." He looked anxiously at the old woman,but she made no sign. "And so let's to bed."

  "This way," said the old woman, and by the light of a candle she ledthem upstairs.

  * * * * *

  Udo slept badly. He had a feeling (just as you have) that somethingwas going to happen to him; and it was with some surprise that he wokeup in the morning to find himself much as he was when he went to bed.He looked at himself in the glass; he invited Coronel to gaze at him;but neither could discover that anything was the matter.

  "After all," said Udo, "I don't suppose she meant anything. These oldwomen get into a way of talking like that. If anybody is going to beturned into anything, it's much more likely to be you."

  "Is that why you brought me with you?" asked Coronel.

  I suppose that by this time they had finished their dressing. RogerScurvilegs tells us nothing on such important matters; no doubt frommodesty. "Next morning they rose," he says, and disappoints us of apicture of Udo brushing his hair. They rose and went down tobreakfast.

  The old woman was in a less cryptic mood at breakfast. She wasparticularly hospitable to Udo, and from some secret store produced anunending variety of good things for him to eat. To Coronel it almostlooked as if she were fattening him up for something, but thissuggestion was received with such bad grace by Udo that he did notpursue the subject.

  As soon as breakfast was over they started off again. From one of themany bags of gold he carried, Udo had offered some acknowledgment tothe old woman, but she had refused to take it.

  "Nay, nay," she said. "I shall be amply rewarded before the day isout." And she seemed to be smiling to herself as if she knew of somejoke which the Prince and Coronel did not yet share.

  "I like to-day," said Coronel as they rode along. "There's a smell ofadventure in the air. Red roofs, green trees, blue sky, white road--Icould fall in love to-day."

  "Who with?" said Udo suspiciously.

  "Any one--that old woman, if you like."

  "Oh, don't talk of her," said the Prince with a shudder. "Coronel,hadn't you a sense of being _out_ of some joke that she was in?"

  "Perhaps we shall be in it before long. I could laugh very easily ona morning like this."

  "Oh, I can see a joke as well as any one," said Udo. "Don't be afraidthat I shan't laugh, too. No doubt it will make a good story,whatever it is, to tell to the Princess Hyacinth. Coronel," he addedsolemnly, the thought having evidently only just occurred to him, "Iam all impatience to help that poor girl in her trouble." And as ifto show his impatience, he suddenly gave the reins a shake andcantered ahead of his companion. Smiling to himself, Coronel followedat his leisure.

  They halted at mid-day in a wood, and made a meal from some provisionswhich the old woman had given them; and after they had eaten, Udo laydown on a mossy bank and closed his eyes.

  "I'm sleepy," he said; "I had a restless night. Let's stay hereawhile; after all, there's no hurry."

  "Personally," said Coronel, "I'm all impatience to help that----"

  "I tell you I had a very bad night," said Udo crossly.

  "Oh, well, I shall go off and look for dragons. Coronel, the DragonSlayer. Good-bye."

  "Only half an hour," said Udo.

  "Right."

  With a nod to the Prince he strolled off among the trees.